Reply #44: I still disagree [View All]

[PurityOfEssence]

I'll take this off the board later, but I don't see that you've made your case here. I DO, however, appreciate the tone and wish others could be as civil.

I'm well aware that we've conducted joint operations and operations in Pakistan on our own and with the Pakistanis' blessing, but unless something drastic has happened of late we don't have combat troops stationed there, which is what I said. As for the assistance or permission of the Pakistanis being secured for the Obama hypotheticals, that's almost by definition NOT the case.

It's important to separate the various statements and parse them as different pronouncements, as they are. Let's separate these two: the "battlefield of Afghanistan and Pakistan" and the hypothetical "action" to be taken against particular adversaries. Perhaps Musharraf's permission would be sought and granted for expanding the battle into Pakistan on a more regular basis; if so, this would not be an "invasion", since the government's permission was granted. If, however, we went in to hit targets which Musharraf refused to pursue, that would be, BY DEFINITION, a violation of sovereignty. The whole premise of the latter hypothetical is that it would be done in spite of the sovereign government of an ostensibly allied nation.

Thus, since my justification of others' summation of his statements as endorsing "invasion" is based on the "battlefield" quote and not the "action" quote, perhaps this doesn't necessitate invasion. Perhaps he'd get permission for us to be on the "battlefield" in Pakistan and he'd only violate the sovereignty of Pakistan in the other instance with an unannounced and unsanctioned airstrike, which isn't all that clearly an "invasion". Still, the underlying fact remains the same: he's taunting an ally who's in a very precarious position and threatening to defy the man and his government by raining unsanctioned destruction on sovereign territory. He's also insulting and intimating duplicity or cowardice (or both) in a situation where an ally's sitting astride a powder keg with nuclear weapons.

None of this is wise, and the true misstep here is making macho, broad-strokes pronouncements in a VERY volatile environment. The greatest mistake here is the glibness with which he makes sweeping statements and the way he backpedals to deny culpability. His performance at the Chicago Forum (mercifully they didn't call it a "debate") was a mess; only true supporters or corporate media hacks are going to love that bad tippy-toeing. He tried to erase the past by talking about the "mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan"; there are no such things: you're in either of the two countries. If it sounds picky for me to say that, it's just monumental bullshit prevaricating twaddle for him to duck reality like that. Over and over he said that he was saying that he'd work with Musharraf and all that and that he'd said it repeatedly, but if you read his comments of late, that's simply not the case.

So, since we're not BASED there, if we launch an uninvited incursion, that's an INVASION. The fact that we've been invited (or tolerated or assisted) before means nothing. To your credit, though, the "battlefield" quote was not linked to the hypothetical of doing an end-run around Musharraf should he not act on actionable intelligence, it was just within a matter of days. Perhaps he'd just use a mere deadly airstrike that doesn't leave anyone behind. It's stretching it to call an airstrike an "invasion", although since we're projecting military force into another country it's a reasonable stretch. Thus, I'll stand by the statement: that, too, is an "invasion" and we'd be "invading" their airspace to do so; I wish he'd stand by his quotes or admit some kind of wrong, instead of huffing and "clarifying".

The problem is his lack of specificity itself. If he won't take action, we will. "Action" is a pretty thick book of options with all the toys the C-I-CUS has, isn't it? If they're not delineated, one can fairly assume that it's a really big table with all sorts of things on it. That's why he was asked about nukes; he was unclear in the first place.

He never said just how he'd take out such a target, and this is the real problem: vague certainty about projecting military power to cause death.